On Friday I spent some time in the North Bay. I don’t often get to this area of the San Francisco Bay, but I like visiting it because it can be very beautiful.
My destination was Petaluma and my traffic app took me through the East Bay on the way there. The route was mostly interstate until the turnoff for the Richmond Bridge.
The Richmond Bridge has an interesting structure and is a double decked bridge. The westbound lanes are on top and the eastbound below. I kept in the middle lane the whole way as I really do not like bridges too much.
After attending the memorial service for my Great Uncle, I headed back home. This time my traffic app took me through the North Bay as traffic would start building up by the time I reached the Tri-Valley.
It is nearing the end of the rainy season and the hills along the way were nice and green with some yellow accents.
The sky was cloudy and it was threatening a bit of rain. There has been a lot of rain in the past week and you could see a lot of flooding along the route.
I like the big trees that hang over the road as you turn north on Stage Gulch Road. I am not sure why my traffic app took me this way, but there must have been flooding or heavy traffic on the shorter route using Lakeville Highway.
There were also signs of flooding on this road with several places where mud had run across the surface.
The drive through the San Pablo Bay National Wildlife Refuge on Sears Point Road was very nice. I saw a lot of different birds and the views across the San Pablo Bay were really scenic.
In the distance in this picture you can see Mount Diablo. It looks very different depending on which direction you are viewing it. This is almost 180 degrees from where I see it when I leave for work in the morning so it looks very similar.
The drive through Concord, Pittsburg and Antioch was not as nice as there was road construction and heavy traffic. I did see the new BART DMU line in action. I am looking forward to when they extend the line toward Byron as it may be a good alternative to getting to San Francisco if I need to visit the city.
Finally I was on the home stretch and the drive from Antioch down Byron Highway was really nice as I was just ahead of the evening commuters.
The drive home was long, but at least it was scenic for most of the way.
Steven
Here you see the hills in early February when we had snow on the higher peaks.
Here you can definitely see that the rains have brought color to the hills. I took this picture a couple weeks ago.
On Friday I was in the North Bay where the hills were also green.
It is nice to see vistas like this when driving to and from work. This is one of the most beautiful times of the year when driving over the Altamont.
Here is a contrast of summer and winter on the Altamont. Right now the Altamont looks like the picture on the right, but it will only be a few months before it again looks like the picture on the left.
Braman's Wanderings 